Sudhir Shivaram Photography, a leader in wildlife photography education, faced limitations with their existing hosting solution. Migrating their BuddyBoss-powered course platform to Rapyd hosting resulted in a significant boost in performance, scalability, and value. They now effortlessly handle thousands of users with blazing-fast response times, while enjoying exceptional support and bundled features.
Customer Introduction
Sudhir Shivaram Photography ignites a passion for wildlife conservation through captivating photography courses and tours. Led by the renowned wildlife photographer Sudhir Shivaram, the organization empowers students with a comprehensive learning experience. Their online courses have garnered a loyal following, exceeding 10,000 subscribers. Sudhir Shivaram wanted to cater to this growing community by delivering exceptional online education. However, they needed a robust and scalable hosting solution.
Problem
The initial hosting setup of Sudhir Shivaram Photography included twelve virtual CPUs and 48GB RAM. Even though the server was powerful on paper and physically close to most of its users, it was performing terribly.
“The Vultr high-frequency server was based out of Mumbai,” Sudhir shared.
Performance bottlenecks emerged as user traffic increased, causing a dip in website performance. :
“What we did is like we ran a test of 50 virtual users… So when we used 50 virtual users and the load for five minutes, the server did start noticing the kind of traffic that we were getting. And now what we did is like we went up to 350 virtual users. So when we went to 350 virtual users, the cpu usage went to like 100% for the PHP workers. And that was the maximum load that the virtual high-frequency server could take.”
They wanted to continue delivering a high-quality online learning experience for their wildlife photography students. The need for a scalable and performant hosting solution became paramount for Sudhir Shivaram Photography.
Solution
Sudhir Shivaram discovered Rapyd hosting through the BuddyBoss Facebook group.
He added that the cost of the previous hosting was also a factor in deciding on Rapyd for Sudhir Shivaram Photography. “The previous Vultr HF and the RunCloud that I was using, the overall cost was more than $400 per month. In fact, probably around 450 plus dollars per month is what I was paying over there.”
He then explained why Rapyd is much more cost-friendly for him, especially with the premium tools that come with the package.
Sudhir also shared his experience with Rapyd’s free migration for Sudhir Shivaram Photography. He said, “I logged into my servers, checked everything, and it was absolutely fine, and then I requested for the complete migration, changing the DNS, everything was very nicely taken care of.”
Results
Sudhir Shivaram Photography’s migration to Rapyd hosting was a huge success. Their website performance and scalability are much better now.
Sudhir Shivaram shares the impressive results:
Even though the server is based in Ireland, his performance is now better than before. “The server is based out of Ireland. So with that, what we did was a load test varying, from 50 virtual users to 700 virtual users. So, with the previous hosting, it basically topped up at 350. Now here, even with 700 virtual users, the overall response time went down from say 1 second compared to previous to just 200 to 300 milliseconds.”
So, Sudhir Shivaram Photography can now comfortably handle a larger user base with exceptional performance, all at a cost-effective price point. The exceptional level of support from the Rapyd team is another big advantage for him. As Sudhir shared, “What I get now, each time, whatever issues or whatever support I needed using my Rapyd dashboard, I just went onto the chat and at any point of time, always a support person was available to take me through all the issues, whatever queries, anything I had, they used to get it resolved.”
“The support is one thing which we always look for, and in this case, I think it’s absolutely top-notch,” he added.
Conclusion
Sudhir Shivaram Photography’s investment in a robust hosting solution has yielded impressive results. Their website can now comfortably handle a significantly larger user base with blazing-fast response times, creating a noticeably smoother and more responsive learning experience for their students.
“Since it’s (BuddyBoss) their own platform, they know what they have designed,” Sudhir expressed his opinion on why he thinks Rapyd has such a big impact on his website.
With a solid foundation in place, Sudhir Shivaram Photography is poised for continued growth and success in fostering a love for wildlife photography through exceptional online education. He credited this transformation to Rapyd Hosting, saying “What you folks are giving me, the specific experience. The whole migration process, I should say, was very smooth. And even after migrating, the follow-up support, everything, absolutely flawless. So a big kudos to your support team.”
